New Book Claims Donald Trump Regularly Made Homophobic Remarks
According to a new book, former President Donald Trump would try and guess the sexuality of those who worked around him and regularly used homophobic and transphobic slurs.
Trigger Warning: This story discusses homophobic and transphobic comments, which might be distressing to some readers. For 24 hour crisis support and suicide prevention call Lifeline on 13 11 14. For Australia-wide LGBTQI peer support call QLife on 1800 184 527 or webchat.
These revelations are found in New York Times reporter Maggie Haberman’s new book, Confidence Man: The Making of Donald Trump and the Breaking of America, set to be released October 4.
In an excerpt reviewed by The Daily Beast, Haberman writes that Trump routinely tried to guess who on his staff could be gay.
Haberman states that in a meeting with Vice President Mike Pence and spokesperson Jason Miller at the beginning of his presidency, Trump remarked that Miller “likes the ladies.”
Trump went on to say, “You know how sometimes someone turns out to be gay later and you knew? This guy, he isn’t even like one percent gay.”
Homophobic And Transphobic Slurs
Haberman writes that former Trump employees recall “Trump mocking gay men, or men who were seen as weak, with the words ‘queer’ or ‘faggot.’”
According to former Trump Organization executive Alan Marcus, Trump would bully and “belittle” an employee that Trump thought was gay and “bragged that he paid the executive less.”
During debate prep for the second debate of the 2016 Presidential Election, when asked a question by an aide from the perspective of a transgender female student about bathroom access, Trump remarked, “Cocked or decocked?”
A person in the room asked, “Decocked?” Trump then started to make “a chopping gesture,” saying, “with cock or without cock?”
When an advisor asked what difference it would make, Trump responded “What if a girl was in the bathroom and someone came in, lifted up a skirt, and a schlong was hanging out.”
History of Similar Remarks
Trump is obviously no stranger to this kind of rhetoric.
During a speech in Washington DC on July 26, Trump went on a transphobic rant saying that, “The sickos who are pushing sexual content in kindergartens or providing puberty blockers to young children who have no idea what a puberty blocker is – neither do I, by the way, neither do most of the people in the audience.”
He continued, “Let’s just say they’re not good – are not just engaged in acts of depravity, in many cases they are breaking the law and they should be held fully accountable.”
At an April fundraiser, at his Mar-a-Lago resort, Trump told a “Gays For Trump” supporter in the crowd that they “don’t look gay.”
